Durban - Move over Robocop and Judge Dredd, our very own Metro police cars are moving swiftly into the 21st century.
Unveiled at the ninth annual GovTech conference in Durban earlier this week was SA’s next-generation police car. In partnership with Vodacom and Samsung, Metro officers can look forward to both latest-generation technology and connectivity to help catch the bad guys.
Break the law and these Inspector Gadget-mobiles will be at the ready with cameras which will authenticate your numberplate before sending video footage, voice communication and instant messages to Metro’s central command centre for processing.
“This technology will empower the central command centre to make decisions based on relevant information in real time,” says Vuyani Jarana, Chief Officer at Vodacom Business.
The in-car tech - which can also be retrofitted to existing Metro cars - will allow for the checking of ID numbers, drivers licences, and outstanding fines - and the immediate printing of infringement notices on the car’s mobile printer.
Data captured by the hardware will be also be time-stamped and geo-tagged, helping to increase accountability and making monitoring easier for officers and management alike. And to avoid any loopholes, the central control facility will be able to monitor, activate and deactivate these devices remotely.
Driving the new crime-busting tech, which has been successfully deployed in New Zealand and Italy, are Vodacom’s LTE and 3G platforms, with info gathered at ground-level cross-referenced against databases administered by the Department of Transport and the Department of Home Affairs. Electronics partner Samsung will provide the in-car mobile devices, which will include a range of handsets and tablets.
“The information that we’ll be able to put at the disposal of the police, combined with co-ordination from a centralised control centre, will mean a step change in capabilities. In short, the police will be able to do more, in less time and at a lower cost than ever before,” said Jarana.
And according to these partners some of this ground-breaking tech will in the near future also become commercially available to security companies, emergency medical services, and cash in-transit operators.
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